


It's Nice To Have A Friend

by ijustsit



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: A Light Dusting of Angst, Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, I would consider it a blizzard, Old Friendships, a touch, fluff with a touch, it's the kind of snow that minnesotans would laugh at but if i were from florida, like that level of angst, of angst, you know ya girl can't handle a lot of angst so it's like
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-11
Updated: 2019-11-11
Packaged: 2021-01-27 09:01:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,448
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21389560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ijustsit/pseuds/ijustsit
Summary: Sometimes, all you need is a pink sky and a rooftop to press restart on something that never should have stopped in the first place.Inspired by Taylor Swift's 'It's Nice To Have A Friend'
Relationships: Josh Dun/Tyler Joseph
Comments: 6
Kudos: 12





	It's Nice To Have A Friend

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you like this! As I said in the summary, this fic was inspired by Taylor Swift's 'It's Nice To Have A Friend'.
> 
> Also, I'm all too aware that I haven't updated Hotel Nights in months. Maybe you care, maybe you don't. I just wanted to say I haven't forgotten about it and I genuinely do plan to continue posting it - it's just not happening at this very moment. 
> 
> Anyways, enjoy!

Everything was pink. The trees, the sidewalk, the sky. Just a light pink, like the softest blush that crosses that cute girl’s cheeks when you say something nice. So soft you aren’t convinced it’s there. Jos liked light pink.

She was sitting on the roof of her house, legs tucked under her arms, chin resting on her knees. Her hair was falling out of its braid but she couldn’t really find it in herself to care. She was too busy focusing on anything, everything, that wasn’t the pit of worry in her stomach.

She focused on the way that cloud just beyond the treeline was a little bit softer in color than the sky behind it. She focused on the way the wind made her hair brush against her cheeks, a mildly irritating tickle. She focused on the texture of the roof tiles - scratchy, grounding. She pretended everything that was too big, too much, just wasn’t really there.

A noise behind her startled her; she jumped a little. It was Tyler. She should’ve known. Jos mentally shredded the few butterflies that had popped into her stomach; residual from that ill-placed crush years ago.

“What are you doing home?” Jos asked. 

“I just decided to come home, I guess,” Tyler answered. She climbed over to sit next to the girl. They were quiet for a few minutes. Jos rested her head on her knees again.

“Didn’t you have a basketball tournament this weekend?” Jos asked.

“I quit.”

Jos turned to glance at Tyler, barely concealing her surprise, then turned her attention back to that cloud. It was changing shape a little; changing color too. She waited. 

“It just was too  _ much _ , you know? Everyone had all these  _ expectations  _ of me, and I’m so tired of it. Get good grades, play good games, and have a good social life. Everyone expects me to prioritize differently, and at a certain point it feels like it’s all or nothing.”

“It suffocating,” Jos offered.

“It IS!” Tyler groaned. She leaned back, laying as flat as the slanted roof would allow. “It’s suffocating and it gets to the point where it feels like removing one thing won’t be enough. I honestly wish I could just drop out at this point.”

“You’ve made it this far, though.”  
Tyler sighed. “Yeah, I know.” She tugged on Jos’s hoodie sleeve a little, pulling the girl back to lay next to her.

“So what are you doing  _ here _ ?”

“I missed you.”

Jos felt Tyler’s brown eyes on her, and pointedly continued staring at the sky. The sun was starting to set. It was quiet for a second, a minute, maybe more. “I missed you, too.”

They’d been the best of friends in third grade, Jos remembered. It all started that day she was walking home and realized she’d forgotten her gloves. It had snowed and it was cold and her little hands  _ hurt _ . But Tyler, who hadn’t forgotten her gloves, noticed. She saw the way Jos was pulling at the sleeves of her coat, trying to slip her hands inside. Tyler had walked up to her and offered Jos a glove. They’d held their bare hands together, sharing warmth. After that, they were inseparable. They did everything together - they camped in each other’s backyards, they got in trouble for passing notes, they picked each other for teams in PE, they helped each other cheat on tests during class. They even pushed each other on the swings - not because they couldn’t swing on their own, but because sometimes it was nice to know that someone had your back. It was just nice to have a friend.

They kept walking each other home and holding hands and sharing gloves and sharing secrets and sharing time with each other, but then they got older and people started asking questions. And for some reason, it really bothered Tyler. Someone started a rumor that they were dating, and suddenly Jos saw less and less of her best friend. She didn’t understand why - they  _ weren’t _ dating. Hell, Tyler wasn’t even  _ gay.  _ They were just friends. Jos was happy with that. 

After that, they were amicable towards each other, but purely on a superficial level. They used to hang out on this roof all the time, sharing everything, but eventually Tyler stopped joining her. This roof had held all their secrets and Tyler completely forgot about its existence. Truthfully, it had been so long that Jos was surprised Tyler even remembered how to scale her way up. But here she was. Here they were.

“Everyone’s asking me what I’m doing with my life, and I have  _ no idea, _ ” Jos said, opening up to her own surprise. She felt Tyler’s eyes on her. 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. ‘What kind of business do I want to go into? Have I thought about what I’m doing after college? You know, I should really start in this position. It’s the quintessential opening position for a young businesswoman.’ It’s exhausting.”

“Suffocating,” Tyler repeated from earlier. 

Jos laughed a little. “Yeah, suffocating.” She fell silent. Enough opening up for one day, she supposed.

“So, uh,” Tyler coughed. “Other than that, how’s… life?”

“‘How’s life?’” Jos quoted. 

“Yeah, that’s probably a loaded question.”

“Just a little bit.” She sat back up, tucking her knees back beneath her chin, again wrapping her arms around herself. She felt safest when she was smaller. “It’s fine, I guess.”

“Just fine?” Tyler asked, not goading, just serious.

“Yeah… I, uh, I’m out, loosely speaking.”

“Out?”

“...Of the closet,” Jos deadpanned. Her heart sank. A part of her had thought she was wrong about what happened years back, that maybe she’d misread the situation. That maybe Tyler wasn’t… well, homophobic. 

“Ah. Can’t say the same.”

Jos rolled her eyes. “Well, you don’t really have to come out.”

“Wait, what?”

“I mean, straight people don’t have to ‘come out,’ ya know? It’s just kind of… assumed,” Jos explained.

“Jos Dun, do you think that I am straight? Me? Tyler Joseph?”

At that, she looked at Tyler, really looked at her. Ignoring how beautiful she looked, Jos noted that Tyler was wearing one of her striped button-up shirts, khakis, and a pair of vans. But plenty of girls wore clothing like that. Jos was many things, but she was not one to stereotype. “I’m not one to stereotype,” she told Tyler.

“Well, my darling, I am a walking stereotypical lesbian,” Tyler said, spreading her arms widely. “I can’t believe you didn’t know, or at the very least, assume. I mean, we used to be best friends.”

Jos laughed. “Yeah,  _ used to be _ . Until that rumor went around and you all but ghosted me!”

“Ghosted you?  _ Ghosted you? _ ” At that, Tyler sat up. “Jos, I was head over heels for you while you were spending every waking moment trying to convince everyone, including yourself, that  _ we  _ weren’t a thing. Which, we weren’t, but still.”

The gears started turning in Jos’s head. “Oh… oh my god.”

“I get it, you didn’t feel the same, but it was still so-”

“Are you kidding me? I was always a little bit crushing on you… The only reason I didn’t explicitly feel the same way is because I have a rule about falling for straight girls, never-”

“Never fall for them, duh. Well, voila, I am not a straight girl.” Tyler laughed nervously, resting again on the roof. “Not even a little bit,” she said to the sky.

“Hmm.” 

“Now will you lay down next to me and look at this stupidly pink sky?”

“It’s not stupid,” Jos grumbled, laying down next to the girl. Her heart was pounding.

“It’s a little stupid.”

“Oh, good comeback. I’ll have you know, it’s my favorite color.”

Silence again came over them, but this time a bit more comfortable. Jos watched as the sky turned darker shades of pink, slowly giving way to dusk, until finally they were sitting in the dark.

“I will say this,” Tyler said softly. 

“Yeah?”

“Going to school in a tiny town is stupid, but the stars there are incredible.”

Jos murmured in agreement. “Yeah, you can’t really see much here."

“Stupid pollution,” Tyler said.

“Something like that.”

“You should come visit me sometime,” Tyler said quickly, the words rushing out of her. Jos’s heart raced immediately. Stupid, residual crush.

Well, maybe not  _ so _ stupid. “Yeah,” Jos whispered. “I’d like that.”

Tyler’s hand found her own, a quick, warm squeeze. “I’ll see you later,” she said. Then the warmth was gone and Tyler was too, and Jos was both cursing the fact that her hand was tingling in response and debating how soon was too soon to text Tyler about coming to visit her. 

**Author's Note:**

> kind words and feedback are always appreciated! i'm ijustsit on tumblr :) 
> 
> ps - the first time I listened to 'It's Nice To Have A Friend' was in Taylor Swift's living room with Taylor Swift herself. sorry, i just had to throw that in there.


End file.
